First "Digital Report" shows the party's competition on Facebook

Main candidates of the parliamentary parties to Number of voters on Facebook, number of Facebook fans © Graphic: APA
Best candidates in the parliamentary elections in number of parties Facebook ©: APA

Vienna, Heinz-Christian Strache before Sebastian Kurz before Christian Kern: Here is how the rankings of the leaders of the FPÖ, ÖVP and SPÖ, measured by the number of Facebook interactions for their display According to the "Digitalreport" presented Tuesday, Kurz and Kern have caught up. "Lange For a long time, the FPÖ has dominated the political debate on Facebook," said initiator Ingrid Brodnig.

Brodnig is the Austrian "Digital Champion" of the European Commission and wishes to contribute to the Digital Awareness Report In the report, expert statements and teaching material can also be found in the report [19659007] Facebook Analyze

Luca Hammer, Analyst and Data Programmer, collected and badyzed the data available via the Facebook API: Three Million Likes, 600,000 shares, 500,000 comments between the 1st January and June 1, 2018. Some personal data is no longer available. In order to look at the distribution of the activity to the whole of the users, one thus resorted to a set of data starting from 2017.

A central result of the numerical report: The FPÖ was for a long time on Facebook the first dog, regarding the commitment of users two to three years put ÖVP and SPÖ in motion. Draft horses are party leaders for all three, especially for the ÖVP. The Strache Facebook page (34%) and the FPÖ share share 42% of the parties' interactions. The ÖVP, however, only one percent, runs for 31 percent. "The People's Party's digital strategy focuses on the party leader," said Brodnig: Short on Facebook is the "giant", the ÖVP the "dwarf". Kern collected 14 percent of likes, comments, etc., the SPÖ five percent.

And the other parties? NEOS, List The mushrooms and green vegetables are certainly no less "diligent," said Brodnig. Nevertheless, they are granted less interaction. "The political debate on Facebook is a three-way battle," concluded Brodnig. The emotional responses – expressed in "Love / Haha / Wow / Sad / Angry" -Emojis – are divided differently by party. The majority of the FPÖ, SPÖ and Greens are angry, in the ÖVP, the "Loves" are the strongest, as is the list of mushrooms. The NEOS, in turn, made their fans laugh.

It is not surprising to find that "heights of attention" take place before the elections. But 2018 is a "still extremely controversial year". Therefore: Not every shitstorm or flowerrain moves the mbades, the digital report also confirms it. Because: "Hyperactive users", namely the 20% most active, account for 73% of political comments. "What we read online, it's not the opinion of" people, "says Brodnig, but a noisy minority."

When parties or their bosses bind external sites, the "Kronen Zeitung" (krone.at) quite clearly nose in front. But almost exclusively thanks to Strache and the FPÖ: "In five months, Straches Account has published 139 times the" Kronen Zeitung ", reported Brodnig. Also oe24.at are linked by liberal Facebook pages like. Sebastian Kurz also likes to send his followers to the "Krone". Incidentally, the parties often refer to their own home pages, such as the list of mushrooms, but also the FPÖ or the SPÖ. Frequently related media are also orf.at, derstandard.at, kurier.at and diepresse.com.